I was recently browsing the software section of Neowin and saw a free app called "Patch my PC". For the longest time I have been using a program called "Secunia". It was an OK program but once it found out of date applications went to automatically update them, the process seemed to take MUCH longer than it should. Would always say "Waiting for update to finish" for a few minutes even on something as simple as a flash update.

So I gave Patch My PC a try. As someone who has a lot of out of date machines come into my office, this one seems pretty nice. It's a self contained EXE which requires no install so it can be put on and run from a USB stick. It seems to find the updates fast. Once you click install, it downloads and automatically installs silently all the updates for all the applications that need updating. As far as a customers machine on your work bench, you click install and walk always, and it installs of the important software updates for you.

So download it and throw it into a VM and see what you think.

The /auto switch - This switch will allow the current logged user to see the Patch My PC GUI. The update process will started automatically. If browsers are open Patch My PC will notify user in the log textbox browsers need to be closed before updates can continue.

The /s switch - This switch will run Patch My PC in hidden in the background. If browsers are open it will recheck every ten seconds until browsers are closed then continue with the install.

The /update switch - This switch will run Windows updates automatically after third party updates. This can be used with the /auto or /s switch.

The /applyallcommon switch - This switch will install all the programs in the common list that aren't installed unless the program is marked as skipped.

Examples:

PatchMyPC.exe /s (Will run any needed common updates automatically with no graphical interface).PatchMyPC.exe /auto (Will run any needed common updates automatically with a graphical interface).PatchMyPC.exe /update (Will automatically run windows updates with graphical interface).PatchMyPC.exe /s /update (Will run any needed common updates and then run Windows updates automatically with no graphical interface).PatchMyPC.exe /auto /update(Will run any needed common updates and then run Windows updates automatically with a graphical interface).

*Update 12/2/2012*

One other nice thing about patchmypc that i've started using is it makes it really to install a handful of common applications after a clean install.

Open it and right click on all the applications you wish to install and select "Install / reinstall". The item will then turn red. Do that for every item you wish to install and then click the "Preform X number of updates" button. Then in 1 click all of the applications you selected will be downloaded and installed